A World Cup & A Birthday

It has been a busy week, with Christmas and racing 3 of the last four days. We have been up and out of the team house early each race day to get to the courses which have been 1-1/2 to 2 hrs away. On Saturday we traveled to the Zolder World Cup, Sunday we raced in Diegem, Monday was a rest day and today (Tuesday) we raced in Middelkerke.

Zolder World Cup was an entirely different type of race than I am accustomed to. First of all, I raced in the Team USA Skin suit (a World Cup requirement) which was TOTALLY AWESOME. The race was very aggressive (more than the others) with many riders using it as a full contact sport. The course was pretty rough with several very crazy descents. The course was rough enough that Matt ended up breaking his fork on the course. My warm-up was a bit off, I am not sure if it was the early morning departure of something else, I had a hard time getting warmed up and trouble eating what I needed to. I did my best to put it out of my head and focused on getting a good start. With that, I had an excellent start - good acceleration and pack position.

I didn't run into any problems until around 750 meters into the race and at that point there were several crashes , one in front of me that slowed things up and one beside me that I was tangled up in. Then I started to pay the price for not being able to eat and for my difficulty warming up. I was able to hold my own on the crazy descents, then would lose ground on the flats and power section. I finished the race 46th and while I would have preferred a better position it was a good finished and I fought through the challenges as well as possible. There is a good article of the Zolder World Cup on the Cyclocross Magazine Website with several sweet pictures of the US riders.

Diegem Super Prestige was on Sunday along with my 17th birthday and the race preparation went much better. The course preview went well along with the warm-up and pre-race eating. I felt like everything was spot on, with one exception…….I did not feel like I had any legs. The power was a bit off. So be it. Again I focused on the start and moving up from the back of the starting grid. I just kept pushing on and finished as well as I could. I did manage to break my MAVIC Shoe, which is a bummer - I like those shoes. I am glad I brought my old Adidas shoes. With all of that, I finished about 30 seconds behind Matt Spinks and a minute behind Jeff Bahnson for 45th place.

After racing we returned to the house and continued the normal race routine of getting cleaned up, laundry and eating. After dinner, we celebrated my Birthday with a milk free cake that Els made for me. Actually, it was an apple crisp, it was very thoughtful and well appreciated.

Loenhout GVA Trophee was today and everything was lining up well. My legs felt good, the course preview was time well spent and the warm-up was excellent. The starting position today was better than it has been at the other races to date. Although there was a Belgian rider that tried to line up between me and the fence, I warned him that there was not room, tried to get him to move…..but he insisted on staying. Sure enough on the start, I nailed it with a great acceleration (he did not) only to hear the crunch of metal after about five pedal strokes. He crashed right into the fence and spent precious time untangling his bars.

I managed to pick off a few people as the race went on and was racing well, sitting around 50th just behind Matt. I attacked right after the pit with about a 1/2 of a lap to go and tagged a rock with the front wheel. The rock flatted the tire and it was time to chase. However, after a few hundred yards of running I thought it was best to save the effort for another day. A good race baring one minor mechanical. Then we picked up while the U23 race was underway and scooted back to the Team House after that with another racing day in the books.

Each day I head to bed satisfied that I have squeezed as much as I can. I am having an absolute blast and learning so much along the way. My next race is not until the 1st and that should give me a few days to rest up and get the equipment back up and running.